% My experience with gender reassignment surgery, and my trip to Thailand, part 3
% Leah Rowe
% 2019-01-02

This is a continuation of [my last post](thailand2.md). On the last post, I
ended with my experience just after waking up from surgery.

When Dr. Bank said *Everything was a success* to me, I was so doped up on
morphine and still groggy from the general anaesthetic that I was a total mess
and I couldn't even speak. All I said to him, in a whisper, not even looking
him in the eye was *Thank you*.

I was wheeled back to my room at the hospital. In my head I always think
*hotel* when I think of that room, so I have to correct myself and say
hospital. It was indeed a hospital, but it was a brand new hospital and
Thailand, unlike the UK, doesn't have a national health service. In Thailand,
you pay for healthcare. I was put in one of their luxury rooms. It felt like
a hotel room. It even had a kettle and a small kitchen area, mostly for making
coffee. It had a refridgerator.

Not that I really cared while high on morphine.

<h2>The recovery room</h2>

I don't remember much of that day. I probably fell asleep. The morphine was
still in effect so I didn't really feel any pain at that point.

2nd August to 8 August 2018: I spent this entire time alone in my room.
Nurses would occasionally come to check blood pressure and so on. I spent a lot
of time on IRC (on my laptop) talking to people, and I spent a lot of time
talking to my mother on the phone.

They offered to give me a little button connected to my bedside hooked up to
a drip which would administer small doses of morphine, in case I ever got into
pain. However, I have quite an addictive personality. I'm the type of person
who gets addicted to things easily. I have a history with substance abuse
(mostly alcohol). Being sober these days, and not wanting to fuck myself up
I asked not to have it near me. Thus, I spent this week without any painkillers.

Honestly? It wasn't that bad pain-wise. So long as I kept my legs in a certain
position and stayed laying on my back, I didn't get much pain. Sleeping on my
back is difficult for me, and sleeping on my sides was painful so I didn't
get much sleep sometimes. I'd fall asleep during the day and mostly sleep all
day.

I couldn't touch my vagina during this first week. It was a fresh new wound
from surgery, so it was covered up to prevent infections and whatnot. The
wound cover was quite large and my new genitalia was quite swollen so I couldn't
keep my legs closed together, I had to keep them spread apart slightly.

Prior to surgery, I was very fit. I worked out regularly, mostly on the
bicycle. I could jump straight out of bed and walk for miles. I could run. I
could cycle at 20+mph for an hour straight if I wanted to, on an empty stomach
after just waking up out of bed. And I did so regularly (*fast* cycling helps
burn fat. Then you eat breakfast after your session).

Contrast that to 2 days post-op. I had taken for granted being able to walk.
Against the advice of the nurses, I got up to make coffee. Big mistake.
I didn't damage myself in any way, luckily, but I was extremely dizzy and low
on energy. Everything hurt. However, because I'm a total bad-ass and have an
insane pain tolerance, I managed to get to the kettle, fill it up with water
and bring it to my table, along with a full supply of coffee that they had in
a jar. The caffeine helped me stay awake and gave me energy.

This was a very stupid thing to do, but in my head I was doing it out of
defiance. In retrospect, I was quite insane. I could have easily fallen. I
was walking at a snail's pace and struggled to keep my balance. I could have
called the nurse and asked for coffee but I was quite arrogant and used to
being able to do everything myself.

The nurses later (the next day. this happened at night) came into my room and
laughed. They found it amusing that I had made it to the kettle. They
confiscated the kettle because I wasn't allowed to lift anything heavy
(that includes a kettle full of water), and they told me that caffeine was
not good for me in that stage of my recovery. That really pissed me off.

Eating was difficult during this period. I couldn't lean forward too much or
I would be in pain. At several times I had to ask the nurse to feed me.

Farting was painful, because it made my labia flap. Coughing was painful, for
the same reason. Every movement hurt. I had to try to stay still at all times.

During this week, I had a catheter connected to me so that I could pee. The
nurses would come in every day to empty my pee bag. I wasn't allowed to take a
shit unless absolutely necessary. They fed me only very small amounts of food,
all low fibre to prevent a bowel movement. In addition to food, nurses also
came in with medications every day. I requested not to have morphine, but they
did give me paracetomel and ibuprofen. Other medications were things like
anti-biotics (for infections), anti-swelling pills (danzen was the name of the
medication, iirc) plus my anti-depressants. The anti-depressants were supplied
by the hospital and I paid for them myself; Thailand is very strict about
medications when arriving into the country, so I left my prescription at home
and bought a prescription out of pocket when I arrived.

At the end of this week, Suporn came into my room and took the wound cover off.
He inserted a dilator into me, to assess my depth. I had 6.3 inches (these days,
I have about 7 inches. I gained some depth after the swelling went down). He
gave me some anti-sceptic to apply regularly, to keep the area clean.

I was instructed to go to the toilet, to test whether I was able to pee without
a catheter. After trying really hard to pee, a rupture occured but I didn't know
that. I felt liquid coming out so I assumed I was able to pee. However, when I looked
down I could see a dark pool of blood in the toilet. I was very dizzy as a
result of blood loss. I called for the nurse, who then brought Suporn back.
The catheter was re-inserted. After recovering a bit, I was then instructed
to clean my genitals in the shower.

After that, I was discharged from hospital. I spent the next few weeks in a
hotel, with nurses visiting me every day and I went to the Suporn clinic
every 2 days for regular checkups.

The rest of this story will be covered at a later date.

*Tune in next week* :)
